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Friday, September 2, 2011

Vanilla Ice Cream

Vanilla Ice Cream, elegant in its simplicity

Simple, elegant, beautiful — creamy vanilla ice cream enhances so many wonderful desserts, or is perfectly delicious all on its own. This silky and decadent ice cream is packed with rich vanilla goodness.

In a medium saucepan, heat up 1 cup half & half, 1 cup of the heavy cream, sugar and salt over medium heat until warm. Pour the remaining heavy cream into a large bowl and set aside.

Whisk egg yolks in a small bowl. Pour in a little bit of the warmed cream mixture into the yolks, whisking the entire time. Keep pouring the cream mixture into the yolks slowly while whisking — you're doing this so the egg yolks don't cook.

Pour cream and yolk mixture back into the saucepan and continue to heat until mixture is thicker and when you lift the spoon out of it, it is coated with the mixture. Don't let it boil.

Pour the hot mixture through the strainer into the large bowl with the 1 cup of heavy cream and stir to combine.

Chill mixture thoroughly, overnight or for 24 hours until it is very cold.

Store in an air tight container in the freezer with plastic wrap covering the surface of the ice cream to prevent ice crystals from forming.

Makes about 1 Litre

My notes

I used 5 Fold Vanilla, which is a thick, syrupy vanilla that is 5x the strength of extract, and contains vanilla seeds. I bought the vanilla at Well Seasoned but lots of gourmet ingredient-type stores have it. The eggs I used are Born 3 eggs, the yolks of which are super bright yellow, which gave my ice cream its yellow hue.